Concerning Eclipses.

On the 29th of the following month of September, Gustavus Gustav I Vasa, r. 1523–1560, who established the Swedish monarchy and the Lutheran national church., King of Sweden, passed away; on the 5th or 25th of December, Francis II, King of France; and in the year 1561, Mary, widow of King James IV The text says James IV, though Mary of Guise was actually the widow of James V; her daughter was Mary, Queen of Scots. of Scotland, who was at that time the Regent of the Kingdom of Scotland on behalf of her daughter Mary (the royal widow of France), and a sister of the Duke of Guise.

In Spain and Portugal, where the shadow of the moon fell, nothing noteworthy followed; however, upon the deaths of the aforementioned potentates, great changes occurred.

King Francis left his spouse, Mary Stuart, Queen of Scotland, a widow; she remained with her cousin, the Duke of Guise, and left the regency of Scotland to her mother. However, because several prominent nobles had abandoned the old religion and introduced the Reformation under her regency, the Queen Mother ordered everything to be restored to its former state. She sent several thousand Frenchmen along with a French bishop to Scotland. This triggered a great uprising, out of which—after the Regent died—the abolition of bishops in Scotland and a complete change of religion followed. This was aided in no small part by the new Queen, Elizabeth, who did the same in her own kingdom. She accomplished this much more easily because the Reformation had already been brought far along under her father, King Henry VIII, and her brother, King Edward, and had only been halted under the reign of her sister, Queen Mary (the wife of King Philip of Spain). It had not been forgotten, but rather, out of the memory and hatred of the harsh processes of fire and sword carried out by Mary, the Reformation was sought out again all the more zealously.

Thus, at this time, this entire island—as far as the public state is concerned—fell away from the Roman Church, and it remains so to this day.

In France, great discord had already arisen previously under the brief reign of King Francis. Because the King was young and married to the Queen of Scotland, those from the House of Guise took over the government, being kinsmen of the Queen. They set aside the Princes of the Blood The Princes du Sang, the closest male relatives to the French throne., which angered the nobility and incited an uprising at Amboise The Conspiracy of Amboise (1560), a failed attempt by Huguenots to abduct the young King Francis II.. This was punished at once with great bloodshed, along with the Huguenots French Protestants following the Reformed/Calvinist tradition. who had departed from the Roman Church. Even the Princes of the Blood were imprisoned, and a scaffold was already erected upon which several of them were to be beheaded. However, when in the meantime this young King died (as mentioned above) and left the realm to his brother Charles, the ninth of this name, who was still a minor, these imprisoned lords were not only released but also took over the administration of the kingdom according to ancient right. Yet they soon clashed with the King’s mother. Because they released the imprisoned Huguenots at the insistence of the people and established a religious peace in January of the year 1561, the House of Guise brought them and the young King under their power. They persecuted the Huguenots and revoked the religious indult A grant or edict of toleration., from which a very bloody war of religion grew.

Things fared little better for the Netherlands, as if they too had lost their lord. When King Philip lost his wife Mary, Queen of England, in the year 1558, and made peace and alliance with France in 1559, he sailed to Spain and left the Duchess of Parma, Margaret of Austria, as Regent. He had hardly turned his back on the land...